Kind of feel that way this morning. Like if I could just make a committment I could find Glory. Confidence. Strength. Determination.

I was so good yesterday. I had an absolutely perfect day and I want another one today. It’s been so long since I felt good about myself and my choices that yesterday left me feeling like I was positively glowing. I felt like my horoscope was a message written just for me. I’m not reading it today, hee, hee. Don’t want to spoil that positive impact by finding that the message is some generic piece of crap that has nothing to do with me. And I don’t even believe in that stuff. Yesterday was just the right kick in the ass to get me going.

So I went out to the pool and DH was putting in a new skimmer. I haven’t been in it this year and he needed help from the inside to get the thing lined up right. Okay…that’s even more motivation to take the plunge. I jumped in and damn near jumped right back out. I asked DH to look at the temperature and the water was 64 degrees! Hot damn!!! Time to get some wood and get our homemade chiminea pool heater fired up.

Still, I tippy toed over to help DH and, by the time we had the new skimmer set, I’d warmed up pretty good. I used to do 5 laps around the pool to warm up, 45 laps jogging and a final lap to cool down. I walked five laps to warm up and felt like I’d done a full workout. I’m in terrible shape! I jogged five laps and my calves and thighs were hurting and I was breathing like a whale. So I alternated, five laps walking and five jogging for a total of 30 laps.

Hey! It’s a start. Okay?

Our place is very high maintenance and DH and I just haven’t been up to it the last couple of years so there was plenty to keep us busy. I weatherproofed the spa deck and sides and a big wooden planter/bench we have on the patio with a redwood stain. It looks so much better. Then I headed to the koi pond and netted out a ton of dead leaves and crap. Followed that by going across the street to work in the garden. We’re gradually replacing all the wooden privacy fence with vinyl and DH and I moved four wooden panels to replace damaged panels in the back and on the right side of the yard. Then we installed four vinyl panels on the left side around the spa.

By the time we finished, we were both feelin the pain. I barely had enough strength to fix dinner. DH wanted to just order pizza but I refused. I made a rub for some chicken breasts and made my own version of Wendy’s berry almond salad using spring mix, romaine, iceberg, blueberries, strawberries, wafer thin shavings of asiago cheese and almonds. Topped it all with grilled chicken slices and low fat raspberry vinaigrette. Pretty good stuff. I ate a couple bowls of salad and was satisfied. I thought DH was, too, but I caught him in the kitchen a couple of hours later making two grilled cheese sandwiches.

Instead of snacking in the evening, I sat here at the computer using iTunes to download some new music for aerobics. Lady Gaga and a few others ought to keep me moving.

DH told me he thinks it’s our mattress that’s making our backs hurt all the time. I have a hard time with that. We have a really good quality mattress and it’s only five years old so it shouldn’t be causing so much tossing and turning but I told him I’d start looking. I’ve always wondered about those sleep number mattresses. Maybe I’ll check that out.

Anyway, I already felt pain in every muscle in my body so I considered taking half a pain pill and wondered why the ones my sister gave me when we were on a cruise last fall didn’t cause the same problems as the codeine pills the doctor gave me. She and I talked and the ones she had are the same as the ones the doctor gives me. Then it dawned on me. There were two days on the cruise when I was pretty much confined to the cabin because I was dizzy and nauseous. I went back to my entry last December 5th and read it. Sure enough, I got sick taking codeine pain pills. That pretty much reinforced my discovery that I’m allergic to codeine. Instead of a pain pill, DH and I both took a couple of Tylenol PMs and headed to bed.

We both slept a lot better and woke up without backaches but I’m still going to start looking for a new mattress.

It’s rainy and gray outside. I don’t think I’m going to find the motivation to jump into a 64 degree pool today so I’m going to take my newly downloaded music and try to do some step aerobics. Wish me luck!

4:30 Update - Wow! I feel so much better! I cleaned the house and then decided to do some step aerobics. The new music wasn’t fast enough and I felt bogged down. I switched to some old stuff and it was so fast I was ready to keel over after 20 minutes. I justified my decision to quit since it was the first time I’ve done step in ages and figured 20 minutes was a good start.

I went out to the spa and, when I was all warmed up, I talked myself into jumping in the pool. Figured it would feel pretty good after getting all hot and steamy from the spa. NOT! It was like plungeing into ice water. I didn’t even have the sun shining like yesterday. Just gray, gloomy skies and ice cold water. Still…I prodded myself, since I’m already in here…I decided to repeat yesterdays “workout” and started walking around the pool figuring I’d do four walks and six jogs instead of five and five. After four walking laps, I started jogging. Sure enough, my calves and thighs were burning and I was breathing hard but I decided if I could do six laps, I could do seven. I kept going and seven laps became ten, ten became fifteen and I kept going until I jogged thirty laps. I could have kept going but DH came out to talk to me and kind of ruined the feeling. I’m making Hoppin John soup for dinner (My Favorite Recipes category) and he wanted to know what he needed to buy from the store so I could make Hoe Cakes to go with it.

Leave it to DH to ruin a perfectly healthy dinner. Me? I’m not touching Hoe Cakes and, aside from giving him the recipe, he’s on his own.

1 Comments

I’m so glad you took the plunge. If you stay consistent you’ll find that you’ll get back to your former level of fitness faster than you would think.

We have a sleep number bed and I LOVE IT!!! They are definitely worth the money. We have had it for 7 years and it’s just as good now as it was then. The best testimonial I can give for it is when I was pregnant w/Justin I had to sleep on the couch for the last 6 weeks (in our old bed) b/c my hips were sore since I couldn’t sleep on my back or my belly. With Kyle I was comfy until the day I delivered b/c I could make the mattress a bit softer and lean my belly into the mattress, taking some of the pressure off my hips. Plus, it’s way easier to change the sheets b/c the mattress is mostly air and it’s very light.